John Boy

Hi, I suggest you contact Ultrascale. There are now manufacturing replacement brass gears for some Heljan O gauge locos. John

Jeff, JPL Models in Manchester supply cast whitemetal superheater header covers. John

John, Railways in profile No6 Plate 38, shoes E 70680, built 1950. Photographed in late 50's in BR crimson with yellow lining and lettering. Also states 64 in service in 1976, all gone by 1980, so probably in blue before the end. John

Many thanks for help on this topic, especially to Paul and Richard for advise on alternative speakers. John

I have a Bachmann class 24/1 fitted with an ESU V5 sound decoder, Leggomanbiffo. The sound output is very low despite the volume CV set to the max. The built in speaker is mounted below the cooler group fan. The speaker is directly mounted on the pcb with screws. and would appear to face down! Before I gut the loco to change the speaker, has anybody solved the problem already? Thanks in anticipation. John

Amanda, I believe Minories is possible if you accept restrictions. I am proposing to build this in O gauge layout with a total length of 4220mm, the traverser is 1200mm capacity to hold 2, 54 ft coaches and a tank engine. The layout is a caricature of the ex Great Eastern station at North Woolwich on the river Thames. The era is 1950/60 with small steam engines and DMU'S, at this time there was still considerable freight to the waterside industries. John NORTH WOOLWICH.pdf

M&M kits are now supplied by First Class Models , www.firstclassmodels.co.uk They do not list the brake van kit, but if you go to the download section of the website you will find the instruction sheet for the brake van. John

Ian, Midland Rly Dia 336 is illustrated in 'AN ILLUSTRATED HISTORY OF MIDLANDS WAGONS' by R.J.Essery, Volume One. You are correct in assuming that the door bangers are not required for this kit.There are a number of photographs of Midland, LMS, and BR wagons, early ones with single side brakes, later ones with brakes both sides, in this book. There is a further anomaly with this kit as all the illustrations make no reference to bolsters. Midland Rly double bolster wagons were to Dia 339 and 339a, both of which were 15' wheelbase against the 14'7" of Dia 336. The Dia 339 & 339a were also longer at 28' over the buffers. All the illustrations copyright so I cannot copy them here, but if you define your livery era I will attempt to find a wagon number to suit. John

Dave, Thanks for your help in sorting out the DCC decoder for my LLC class 15. As a son of Cleckhuddersfax, or more correctly, Cleckheckmansedge, I like your take on a West Riding terminus. I know the area well, living as a child next to Liversedge Central station on the L&Y Cleckheaton branch, and walking past Heckmondwike Spen, on the Leeds new line, on my way to school. Have you checked out the L&Y terminus in Dewsbury town centre ,it had a canal basin very close by. I always thought it would form the inspiration for a great model. Best Regards John

Paul, I have input the CVs, and the loco now performs perfectly. Thanks again for your help. John

Paul, Thanks for the amended list of CVs. I will input the values and confirm the operation. Many thanks for your help. John

Paul, I have reset the decoder. CVs 3&4 are now reasonable values and the loco drives as I would expect. The marker lights are still adrift F 20= Front lower left F 21= rear top F 22= rear lower right F 23=front lower centre All lights respond to change of direction. Forwards being cab end leading. Thanks for your help John

Duncan, I purchased my decoder from Trains4U who are a Little Loco Stockist, It was the only one they has in stock. However, they were the first one I rang from the list of stockists on the little loco website which is still operating. If you bought your refurbished loco from the Little Loco Ebay site, you may be able to contact Steve through " contact the seller". I did contact Steve through this route, and he said Little Loco were out of stock but may be getting further stock. May first call would be to Digitrains. John

Gentlemen, Thank you for your responses, I have contacted Paul Chetter, and await a reply.

I have purchased a used, but looks unused, Little Loco Class 15 DC version. I emailed Little Loco Co to purchase an appropriate DCC decoder, without response. Rather than settle for a compromise, I rang round the Little loco Co stockists, and was pleased to secure one for £100. The decoder was promptly supplied with full documentation. On fitting and testing the decoder, all sounds are correct. The loco runs backwards when I think it should run forwards, OK easily fixed with CV change. However the brake function does not work correctly as CVs 3&4 are both set to 10, CV 349 set to 6. Before I start to experiment by changing these CVs, does anyone know what the correct values should be? There is a further problem, If all the marker lights are turned on , not only are they not all in the specified positions, but two are on at one end and two are on at the other end, they do however change ends when the loco direction is changed. With the current problems at Little Loco Co, I am loathed to return the chip to the supplier, as I probably will not be able to get another, and the sound functions are good. Any advice will help before I attempt to correct the faults.

Dave, ACE Products used to do a Hachette A3 conversion kit to BR condition. I have never seen it advertised but it was available at GOG shows. The kit contained double chimney, 2 forms of banjo dome. The etched parts cover the later design of cab sides, superheater header covers, German style smoke deflectors and other sundry parts. The basic Hachette kit contains 2 boiler backheads for both left and right hand drive. John

George, Great work on the signal box, and shed, I'm impressed. Have you looked at the Iain Rice O gauge layout plan ' Monksgate Goods Depot '. At 11ft X 21" it is the correct size, and features a signal box, loco shed and warehouse. It is featured in his book ' Designs for urban layouts'. John

Hi Robin, I have one of these kits to build, but not for 12 weeks or so, as other kits are before it on the list. The ' instructions sheets' with my kit are 14 sheets, none of which is a blow by blow account of how to build it. I agree with you that as a starter kit they are inadequate. However, Darren Sherwood-Jones wrote 2 articles in the Model Rail magazine (issue 151, and 152) covering the building of this kit. Even an experienced modeller like him made some errors in construction, some admitted, some not. PM me if you would like a copy of these 2 articles, you will find them very useful. John PS Did you manage to fit DCC sound to your Heljan Class 20?